30 DOMESTICATED ANIMALS AND PLANTS 



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Unused materials. It has been frequently mentioned that the 

 world might have been much richer in domesticated races if it 

 had seemed worth while, or if we had really set about it. 



The bison, whether European or American, would have made 

 a good domestic animal of the cattle kind. The quagga could 

 be domesticated if we needed him. The bighorn of the Rockies 

 would make a sheep, and the peccary or the wild boar would 

 make a pig. The prairie hen would make a better fowl than 

 the guinea hen, and any number of new dogs could be devel- 

 oped from the foxes and the wolves. 



The wild rice of our northern lakes would make an exccl- 

 lent grain for lowlands. The milkweed may have possibilities 

 as a fiber plant. Many of our native fruits and nuts have never 

 been domesticated, and it is a startling fact that our original 

 native grasses of the prairie, numbering many species, are being 

 allowed to disappear without contributing a single new race to 

 our cultivated grasses, — this, too, in face of the fact that we 

 have yet no grass without a serious defect. 



Except for the difficulty of restraint, the deer and the antelope 

 would make valuable domesticated animals. The semidomesti- 

 cation of the skunk has already begun on the great skunk farms 

 where they are raised in numbers for their skins. The frightful 

 odor of this animal when on the defensive has given him an 

 evil reputation, but in truth he is a most gentle animal, with 

 much the disposition of the cat and without its savage ways. 

 The flesh is exceedingly sweet and tender, and it is altogether 

 likely that this little beast may yet become more nearly domes- 

 ticated than will ever be possible with the ostrich, which seems 

 incapable of affection. 



Lost possibilities. Without a doubt many an animal or plant 

 now extinct would have made a most valuable domesticated 

 species, had it been taken in time. It is difficult to give ex- 

 amples because we know so little of extinct species, and because 

 it is impossible to make direct comparisons between a domesti- 

 cated and a wild race, either of the same or a different species. 



